Older People’s Reference Groups Minutes 16th December 2019

Tower Hamlets Older People’s Reference Group Minutes

16th December, Oxford House, 2:00pm-4:00pm

Meeting Coordinators: Angela Hancock (Chair), Sophie Ibotson (Minutes), Linessa Wicks, Caroline E Dare, Claudia St Rose (Volunteer)

Speakers: Denise Jones (Older People’s Champion, TH Council), Amy Sherman and Joseph Lacey- Holland (TH Council)

Attendance: Elizabeth Adebisi, Pauline Canning, Anne Charles, Ruth Davis, Violet Davis, Joy Godsell, Kalsoom Khan, Florence Martin, Patricia McCarthy, Pat Miah, Devika, Joy Middleton, Andrew Patikki, Kate Scannell, Jean Taylor, Tim Oliver, Juliet Thomas, John Wiggett, Esley Xavier, Lucille Samuel, Ann Alison, A Manning

Apologies: Jenny Ellwood, Michael Zacsinsky, Janet Loo

Welcome: Angela Hancock

Housekeeping

The room is looking lovely, thank you to the volunteers for the assistance

Please be respectful and don’t have separate conversations, this can interrupt with other people’s abilities to hear, particularly if they have hearing issues

Health and Wellbeing Strategy: Amy Sherman and Joseph Lacey- Holland (Tower Hamlets Council)

The members will be working together in groups and the feedback will be pulled together.

Amy and Joseph work for Tower Hamlets council and work in policy. The TH health and Wellbeing Strategy will be expiring in March and so they are going to groups in the community and asking them how they can help people to be happy and healthy. They will explain the process as they go.

There will be four stages:

1. Your health and how you would rate it  Health in the widest sense  Mental health, social circles  Rate yourself on a scale  Outcome: Many leaned towards the positive end  Suggestions included: Issues on accessibility: the toilets in Caxton hall were mentioned as a specific example of this, Dangerous cycling, Transport

Positives:

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Older People’s Reference Groups Minutes 16th December 2019

 Family  Club  Friends/regular socialising  Good health  Link Age +  Church  Church on Sundays and chatting with neighbours and friends  Shopping  Holidays  Being able to go out  Being mobile  Having good neighbours  Caxton Hall – meeting people  Having a battery operated wheelchair  Having 2 regular and good carers daily x 5 days and twice a day  Going for short walks – exercise  Meeting people and children  Knowing people in my community  Being able to make a difference to lives (I am healthy and active)  Sport  Being financially secure  I am deaf so I was given a high powered hearing aid and now I can hear loud noises  Being part of groups eg water aerobics and coffee afterwards  Cycling  Reading  I can get out of bed  A cup of tea or coffee  Pain levels  Going on outings  Going to restaurants  Pushing yourself to get out of the house – go walking, to the gym or to the center to meet people  Mental activity eg quizzes, word searches, board games  Being close to shops and transport  Breathing clean air near the river  Going jogging or for walks  Going to the community centre  Going bowling

Negatives:

 In always doing things “by the book”, the council sometimes don’t hear you – some people need more time  Graffiti  No access to internet at home and no one seems to be able to change this  Feeling lack of control – can’t change things  Mobility issues – with walking  Being dependent on others because of anxiety  Health problems – arthritis and stomach problems

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Older People’s Reference Groups Minutes 16th December 2019

 Becoming forgetful  Noise levels from events and litter disposal  Lack of exercise and activity  Poor diet  Loneliness  Not being able to get a straight answer  Nobody wants to do anything to help anyone  Not being able to get out of the house  Pain  Lack of sleep  Being unable to do things as I need to  Having hearing problems – worse in certain environments like church as the sound bounces off the wall  The removal of free travel  Family being far away  Cracks in pavement  Getting on and off underground and trains  Toilet accessibility  Lift access – housing and public transport

Suggestions:

 Stamp down on drug dealing  The council could help explain things better  Better communication with older people  Provide better feedback on questions from the OPRG  More neighbourhood places  Improving street cleanliness (eg dog fouling)  Have more police walking around  Enforce the highway code for bike users – at present some run the traffic lights  More places like Caxton Hall (lunch club for 50+)  Improve street lighting  Reducing trip hazards on pavement  Bring back visitors parking permits  Help me with everyday tasks - pick the leaves in my back yard and do the shopping  Getting Dial Ride sorted out so that I can rely on getting to my club  Link Dial-a-Ride to mobile phones  More traffic free roads  Making it easier with forms you have to fill in  Accessible toilets in all centres eg Caxton Hall  More activities for older people – take us Christmas shopping in the white van, go to restaurants for a meal and take us to the cinema and theatre  The council do not take that many bulky items away now – could provide more information about what we can do  Stop people sleeping in shop doorways and begging at shop doors  Better health care for older people  More police  Making Tower Hamlets a less male-dominated community (there are many groups of young men driving madly, tossing litter onto the street, taking nitrous oxide)  There are too many cheap chicken shops – get rid of them

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Older People’s Reference Groups Minutes 16th December 2019

 Make it easier to contact council services

Thank you for your details suggestions. They will be doing workshops for another month and a bit. The output will be turned into priorities which will be given to the council to turn into policies. They are happy to come back in the future to keep the group in the loop.

Question and Answers

Q: What will happen to the prioritise one they have been written?

A: This will inform the council strategy for the next five years.

Q: What is actually going to happen? We would like to know what will actually be changing. If something can’t change, we would like to have some honesty about what can’t happen as well.

A: The health and wellbeing strategy defines what the challenges are to health and wellbeing, rather than what will happen about it. This will go on to the council, the NHS, TFL etc. They can come back in the spring and there will be another opportunity for discussion. We’re trying to spot challenges for people of different ages, backgrounds, so specific things won’t be expressed in the strategy but general themes highlighted by everybody.

Q: Something that really needs to be address is accessible toilets. One of the centres wants one, Caxton doesn’t want one but needs one. We need to see these, because it stops people going out and isolated them.

A (Denise Jones): There is funding through City Bridge Trust, you can apply to have things like disabled toilets . They will help with anything to do with access, including an access assessment.

Follow up Q: Access keys cost too much

Follow up Q: Anybody can get them through women’s magazines, and it takes away from those who really need them.

Q: What have the similarities and differences been so far?

A: Accessibility, pain management. People want to feel as if there is a community, that they are supported by other people. There have been themes that run through the meetings. We can send you a thematic overview when it has been completed.

Older People’s Champion: Cllr Denise Jones

She has been in Tower hamlets for 52 years. She has three children and 4 grandchildren. She originally worked in the community sector and has been an old labour party member. She has been a councillor

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Older People’s Reference Groups Minutes 16th December 2019 in since 1994 (so 25 years). She used to be the mayor when they used to have them. She works on adult health and wellbeing and has been appointed by the mayor as Older People’s Champion. For the first year, she has been busy with adult health and wellbeing.

Currently she is working on two big projects for older people:

1. Loneliness Taskforce: they want to make TH friendly and find out how people become lonely  Chairs by the director of public health, service managers on poverty etc., social workers, linkage plus  There is a scheme to train people in the council how to talk about loneliness, how to identify it, how to access the issue and deal with it 2. Chairs the Dementia Friendly steering group

They are trying to work out how to make life better in lots of different ways.

Wants to talk about loneliness and what people need to help them. Men are often lonely, especially when their partners pass away, and they lack the essential skills.

They are concentrating on 10 priorities in the Ageing Well Strategy

1) Being dementia friendly 2) Tackling loneliness 3) Information and access online 4) Transport (they have a little bit of money, they could train somebody to drive a mini bus to help groups out)

Communication – there are lots of things out there, but people don’t know about them. How should the council tell the public what is going on? How can we communicate with older people?

 Leaflets?  Online?  Council paper?

How can we be a friendlier borough to older people?

Feedback from Members

 When trying to contact the council, you phone and you can’t get through or you’re told to go online (this comment was met with sounds of agreement in the room)  There is a housing issue in TH: a lot of investment is going into high rise flats, which are getting refurbishments but buildings for older people are underdeveloped  Financial issues  After Grenfell, when there were fire assessments, they found that they discovered that over 200 people were isolated but what happens next? It has reached a standstill  When you need to contact the council, you are often speaking to an automated recording or the person you are speaking to won’t give their name  In the five year plan, there was nothing that was relevant for older people  There should be open meetings for the loneliness taskforce and dementia friendly groups – they should be afraid to have service users there and give them a platform to put items on the agenda, they aren’t meeting the needs of the individual

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Older People’s Reference Groups Minutes 16th December 2019

 There are some great groups, such as the Sundial Centre that do: choir, yoga, keep fit, drawing and painting, IT, and dinners. They have somebody from HS who goes out of their way to help you and it is open 9 – 4. o Q from DJ: How should people find out about this? o A: leaflets, phone calls  The borough is not well services everywhere, some areas find groups like these inaccessible in terms of transport and location  Scratch cards for parking have been moved exclusively online. A lot of older people are missing out because online isn’t accessible to them o DJ: Will go to the council and enquire about why and how the system has changed  They have taken the zones off of the scratch cards, how can you navigate them o (editor’s note: this question may have been misinterpreted)  Dial a ride should use technology similar to Uber (and still pay fair wages). Dial a ride is being killed off and it’s the online low cost alternative to public transport (which is often inaccessible for people with disabilities). It should also be made more eco friendly o TH is looking at this, transport is going electric  Transport is a big issue in Tower Hamlets – Barts is very difficult to get to, you have to use public transport or a taxi.  Wapping is difficult to access o DJ: They are lobbying TFL to improve transport in this area  Dial a ride sometimes doesn’t turn up at all and the alternative is using a taxi: this is expensive and effects your social life if they are cancelling on you – a particular group of people are not being provided with the services that they need and it is isolating them  The paper that is available in Tower Hamlets is only out every three months and it is very difficult to find. She used to work in the library system and made sure it was accessible, but they can never find it  There are huge technological barriers, it is used for parking etc. Suddenly your ability to communicate is whipped away from you o Adam Pervoe: TH are making attempts to address these issues online, by April they will have a single point of access for Information and Advice and social services o DJ: Who uses the internet? 5 people o DJ: Who doesn’t? 10 o DJ: Who would like to? 5  AP: The wheels are turning, gateway housing is aiming to make sure that there is internet access in all their properties o One member lives in a gateway housing scheme and there is internet in the lounge and you can access half a day internet training once a week o Linessa: They have been offering half a day on Mondays at the gateway head office (opposite tube station). It will start again on the 13th January till the end of the month. Then it will be available at Caxton Hall o One member lives in a gateway scheme and has found that the quality has decreased, they’ve taken away the support and taken away the coordinators who used to be able to help out  There is only one bus from to . There should be a route from Wapping through to Stratford  Doesn’t know where to find information about getting thing taken away, the places that she’s tried to contact have said that she has to get a family member to do but she doesn’t have anybody who can help

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Older People’s Reference Groups Minutes 16th December 2019

 Things have changed in the community, new people have moved in and they isolate themselves  There should be intergenerational tech support from teenagers in college or at university  DJ: There are so many different things happening and a lot of initiatives, it’s about knowing about them and being able to go  AP: Unclaimed benefits – the council will know who is eligible using housing benefits, they should get in touch with those who they know are eligible but don’t claim. Could get in touch using a flier, letter, face to face contact, visit their home

Activities happening in Tower Hamlets raised in this portion of the meeting

Activity Type of Activity Contact Details Magic Me Art 020 3222 6064, [email protected] English National Physical activity, [email protected] Ballet: Dance for dementia friendly Parkinson ENBEldersCo - East Performance Art [email protected] Group Caxton Halls Range of activities 0208 981 7124, [email protected] Sonali Gardens (St Range of activities 0207 265 9292 Hilda’s) [email protected] Sundial Centre Range of activities 0203 828 3928, [email protected] Neighbours in Range of activities 0207 987 0257, Poplar [email protected]

Suggestions for future meetings

 Chief executive  Visual aids to take away with them  Transport: and the progress of the report  Parking and scratch cards

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